5:23 “‘Then the priest will write these curses on a scroll and then scrape them off into the bitter water. 1
19:17 “‘For a ceremonially unclean person you must take 2 some of the ashes of the heifer 3 burnt for purification from sin and pour 4 fresh running 5 water over them in a vessel.
20:2 And there was no water for the community, and so they gathered themselves together against Moses and Aaron.
20:13 These are the waters of Meribah, because the Israelites contended with the Lord, and his holiness was maintained 6 among them.
24:6 They are like 7 valleys 8 stretched forth,
like gardens by the river’s side,
like aloes 9 that the Lord has planted,
and like cedar trees beside the waters.
33:14 They traveled from Alush and camped at Rephidim, where there was no water for the people to drink.
1 sn The words written on the scroll were written with a combination of ingredients mixed into an ink. The idea is probably that they would have been washed or flaked off into the water, so that she drank the words of the curse – it became a part of her being.
2 tn The verb is the perfect tense, third masculine plural, with a vav (ו) consecutive. The verb may be worded as a passive, “ashes must be taken,” but that may be too awkward for this sentence. It may be best to render it with a generic “you” to fit the instruction of the text.
3 tn The word “heifer” is not in the Hebrew text, but it is implied.
4 tn Here too the verb is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive; rather than make this passive, it is here left as a direct instruction to follow the preceding one. For the use of the verb נָתַן (natan) in the sense of “pour,” see S. C. Reif, “A Note on a Neglected Connotation of ntn,” VT 20 (1970): 114-16.
5 tn The expression is literally “living water.” Living water is the fresh, flowing spring water that is clear, life-giving, and not the collected pools of stagnant or dirty water.
3 tn The form is unusual – it is the Niphal preterite, and not the normal use of the Piel/Pual stem for “sanctify/sanctified.” The basic idea of “he was holy” has to be the main idea, but in this context it refers to the fact that through judging Moses God was making sure people ensured his holiness among them. The word also forms a wordplay on the name Kadesh.
4 tn Heb “as valleys they spread forth.”
5 tn Or “rows of palms.”
6 sn The language seems to be more poetic than precise. N. H. Snaith notes that cedars do not grow beside water; he also connects “aloes” to the eaglewood that is more exotic, and capable of giving off an aroma (Leviticus and Numbers [NCB], 298).